Bots Now Dominate Online Shopping Traffic, New Report Reveals

A new cybersecurity report warns that fake traffic is now overtaking real shoppers on e-commerce websites.

The face of online shopping is changing — and not necessarily for the better. New research from cybersecurity company Radware shows that bots, not humans, now account for the majority of online shopping traffic.

According to Radware’s 2025 E-commerce Bot Threat Report, automated bots made up 57% of all visits to e-commerce websites during the 2024 holiday season. It’s the first time bots — computer programs that mimic human behaviour online — have outpaced real shoppers.

While not all bots are bad (some, like search engine crawlers, are harmless), the report warns that many are designed to carry out malicious activities. These include scraping prices, hoarding inventory, committing fraud, and launching attacks against online retailers.

"Today’s bots are powered by artificial intelligence and are much harder to detect," said Ron Meyran, Radware’s Vice President of Cyber Threat Intelligence. "Retailers who rely on outdated security measures could be leaving themselves wide open to attacks, not just at Christmas, but all year round."

What's happening?

The report highlights several worrying trends:

• Smarter bots: Many of the malicious bots now behave almost like real shoppers. They use techniques such as switching IP addresses, rotating identities, and solving CAPTCHAs to avoid detection.
• Mobile under attack: Cyber criminals are shifting their focus to mobile shopping apps. Malicious bot traffic targeting mobile platforms jumped 160% between 2023 and 2024.
• Hiding in plain sight: More attacks are coming from residential internet networks, making it harder to tell bots apart from real users.
• Mixing attack methods: Instead of relying on one tactic, attackers are combining bot activity with other types of hacks, such as exploiting website vulnerabilities and targeting APIs (the software that connects apps and services).

Why it matters

As shopping habits continue to shift online, especially via smartphones, the growing presence of bots could affect everything from product availability to website performance and even the prices consumers pay.

For businesses, the challenge is twofold: stop bad bots without blocking legitimate shoppers, and keep pace with attackers who are constantly updating their methods.

The report suggests that retailers will need to adopt smarter, AI-powered security tools that can distinguish between real customers and sophisticated bots — or risk falling victim to fraud, lost revenue, and reputational damage.

With the 2025 holiday shopping season on the horizon, the pressure is on for e-commerce providers to rethink their defences before the next bot-driven buying frenzy hits.

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